It appears that currently at university we have an operations project due on Monday.

However the situation is as follows:

We were originally four people (placed as a group by seminar tutor). Since then one has changed course and the other dropped out (was never really there before anyways).

The other is doing nothing, despite me asking him on a daily basis. I've seen his work before and it is pretty much rubbish anyways.

This leaves me by myself doing the work of four people.

The question remains, should I tell the lecturer (who is grading the piece about this) when I hand in the coursework (eg by clipping a note on). Or be kind and let the other guy share the grade for something they didn't do.

Knowing that if I do rat out, it will affect him and he will know who spoke out.

A month ago I spoke with him by email, his [module leader] reply was as follows:

"I understand your situation, as there are always a few assignment groups like this on large modules. Please be assured that I am always very careful to make sure that students who contribute their fair share to a piece of coursework do not lose out because of the lack of effort of a fellow team member. You may also be interested to know that last year I penalised a number of individual students for lack of contribution to their respective assignment groups. One of of these students had to do a referral assignment over the summer and others are having to repeat the whole module this year.

[...]You should each submit a brief statement of your respective contributions with the final report and I will take your comments into consideration when I come to mark the assignment. If it turns out that he has not contrbuted much and you have had ongoing difficulties in making contact with him, then I will take into account during the marking process the fact that you have effectively worked as a group of 2.
"

That was when I was questioning one of the people's involvement. I hadn't questioned the one who remains with me today.

Quoting Runway23 (Thread starter):You should each submit a brief statement of your respective contributions with the final report and I will take your comments into consideration when I come to mark the assignment. If it turns out that he has not contrbuted much and you have had ongoing difficulties in making contact with him, then I will take into account during the marking process the fact that you have effectively worked as a group of 2.

Just do exactly that, write down all that you did and see what the other guy puts. If he lies about it, then it sounds as if your tutor is astute enough to be aware of your situation and will pick him up on it.

I know how you feel, I detest group work like this, because it is only me who ever seems to want to do the work, of course I have no issue with shopping the slackers, tough shit on them, I'm not paying for my education only to be dragged back by those who don't care I think I'm going to do it all for them. Incidentally, none of the people in my case made it past the first year, I was not surprised either.

I had a class where it was a group project, three of us total including me. This guy and me were the only ones working. It involved a lot of meetings with businesses in the surrounding community. And then working on a website for their needs. The other kid never went to a meeting, never met up with doing the web project. He didn't do an ounce of work. My partner and I were considering ratting him out but decided against it. The professor however knew he didn't do anything. He set me aside after class one day and asked me frankly if he did anything to the project to contribute. I said he did not. He thanked me for my honesty and then next lecture he asked the kid what he contributed to the project. He just lied to him about what he did, he said he knows he is lying and failed him for the project.

I've done quite a few seminars this year that are supposed to be groups, however, I normally just do all the work myself because I trust my work more than others unless I know the other people in the group. I wouldn't rat anyone out, just do the work yourself and you'll get a better grade, and if it comes to a presentation, it's pretty obvious who knows their shit and who doesn't.

We only hand in one piece of coursework for the whole year (ie this one) which counts for 30% of the total grade.

Apart for the lectures in a 250 seat room I have only spoken to him once outside and of course emailed him.

Other than that I have one of his colleagues for seminars however there also we only discuss and do not hand in work.

There is no presentation either.

At this point I'm pretty much swinging 90% towards rating him out.

There have been some new developments since yesterday:

Just about 25 minutes after I posted this thread hey phoned me.

I had told him on Wednesday that I would be doing first hand research today and that he was free to come along should he wish so.

So all is good, I tell him when I would be there (130pm) and where. He confirmed that and said he would come or that if he didn't I should assume he was not coming (I would have never come to that conclusion without his brilliant logic skills).

So anyways, guess what. No sight of him at the place I was doing research (despite being there more than one hour doing research). Nor has he called, emailed or texted me.

There's so much one can do to be nice, but I've tried to be flexible in giving him the benefit of the doubt on more occasions than I should have. It really isn't fair for me to let someone else have the same grade for something they contributed absolutely nothing to.

Quoting Thetuna (Reply 6):Your there to get an education. It's somewhat like business.

Exactly, universities are supposed to prepare students for the real world. The instructor needs to know who did the work. You wouldn't ket someone ride your coat tails in your career, why should you let that same someone ride at school.

Hell, I once had an instructor in a marketing class that handed out only 1 "A" on the final paper/project. He said that in the real world only one person gets the promotion. That lesson sticks with you.

By the way, since we are talking education...it's "you are" or "you're" not "your."

Were these groups 'assigned' by the class instructor at random, or did everyone form their own?

I've been in a similar situation myself, with two people (myself being one) doing the work of five. And in the end I had to do a bulk of the proofreading/grammar checking because I was the only one who spoke native English.

My group was that 'leftover' group of people who didn't know each other after everyone else paired off.

This is very important to your case. When I was in teh same situation at Uni a few yrs back we hadn't actively got one of the others involved and he had a case against us as he cclaimed we weren't acting as a group.

In answer to your question, yes you should rat them out. Your grades at Uni are worth way more than a friendship that may well die when you leave anyway.

Every major group assignment I did in University involved a peer evaluation where the group decided how to dole out the marks. In some cases this ended up in one group member getting a C- on an assignment that received a B+. If you don't have this there is no accountability.

The best thing is to let the prof know about the problems early so they can offer a compromise.

Quoting CPDC10-30 (Reply 12):Every major group assignment I did in University involved a peer evaluation where the group decided how to dole out the marks. In some cases this ended up in one group member getting a C- on an assignment that received a B+. If you don't have this there is no accountability.

We do that as well in our group courseworks.

Before we hand in the coursework our lecturers give out a sheet to be filled in. You list all the poeple in the group, then put a percentage of how much work that person has done. So you all sit round and do it, and sign it to say you all agree.

It causes some very interesting arguments and debates and things have got a bit heated before but in the end it usually turns out ok. Last year I was working in a group of 5. Four of us worked very hard, one did nothing. So whereas iseally it would have been 20% each, it ended up with four lots of 25% and a 0%. He knew he hadn't done the work and even though he was pretty p*ssed off, what could he do, he agreed and signed.

Lecturers love giving out group work. Telling us the benefits of team work and group management etc. But if they are going to give out group work they should be prepared for situations like this.

I had this issue a few weeks ago. Can this particular project contain a brief essay about the difficulties of working as a team when there appears to be only one active member? If so, start writing. It worked for me a few weeks ago.

'Somebody tell me why I'm on my own if there's a soulmate for everyone' :Natasha Bedingfield